


CoSL 7: Under the Influence

by Dracophile



Series: Grimm-The Casebook of Sloane Larson [7]
Category: Grimm (TV)
Genre: Blood, Demonic Possession, F/M, Fixing Canon, episode rewrite, starting to slip out of canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-28
Updated: 2018-10-28
Packaged: 2019-08-08 17:23:20
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 20,320
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16433663
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dracophile/pseuds/Dracophile
Summary: Rewrites of "El Cucuy" and "Stories we Tell our Young"--but with more going on between, around, and during them as I think Canon missed a few opportunities!In between trying to track down a vigilante killing criminals and help a boy who's apparently possessed; Sloane is trying to get back to training Nick in how to be a Grimm and general badass. But Nick is still feeling the effects of Baron Cemetere's toxin--and he's not always in control. Sloane might have more to worry about from him than the wesen around her if they can't figure out what's wrong.





	CoSL 7: Under the Influence

_El Cucuy_

_\--------------------_

 “So…did you get a message from my mom too?” Nick asked one day at work. It was late October now, with a fall chill in the air and they were walking from the car garage to the precinct. Things were back in a lull after the incident with Margo Barnett and the hexenbeast book, but lulls never lasted long.

Sloane looked up from sipping her coffee. “Message?”

“Yeah. I got an email from her and she mentioned “I hear you’ve met S and she’s staying for a while. I hope you two are getting along.” I figured that must be you.”

Sloane snorted. “I got a call from her last week.”

“Wait, she called you?” he asked, frowning a little.

“Don’t be jealous. You’re mom has call systems in place she probably didn’t get a chance to teach you, so email is safer.”

“Call system?”

She looked around a bit to make sure no one else was nearby before pulling out her phone. “We can’t always keep the same numbers, and it’s dangerous to have numbers in our directories sometimes. So we have a system. If a number I don’t recognize calls, I wait. If it calls again less than two minutes later, I pick up. Kelly does the same. It helps us know it’s safe to pick up. And since I don’t always have a computer or internet handy, it’s easier for her to call me while it’s better for her to email you.”

“Oh…that makes sense, yeah,” he said, nodding.

“She called me last month too. She’s taken to do it once a month to see how you’re doing. And me, but mostly you.” He smiled a little. “Last month she said whatever she’s doing wasn’t working out because of an assassination, and it’s still effecting her now. Apparently it was Renard’s brother that got offed, the one that tried to kidnap you.”

Nick was surprised again by that. “Really? Huh…can’t say I’m too disappointed he’s gone.”

“Only thing better would be if one of us did it after what he put you and those others through,” she said, sipping her coffee again.

Nick didn’t really argue with her on that one. “…I told Juliette about her. Which I hadn’t done before. Like me up until last year, she thought my mother died when I was a teenager…”

Sloane paused, having forgotten that bit. “And…how’d that go?”

“Good,” Nick said. “I mean, she was a little irate at first. I’d let her go into my email to look at the hospital results, and I think she thought the email was from another woman, since it ended “Love you, M”.”

“Ah…that sounds awkward?” she said delicately, unsure how to step around it.

“A bit, yeah. So I really had to make sure she understood the truth. I had to explain some other things that happened in the past before she knew too. But it’s out in the open now, so...I think we’re going to be okay.”

Sloane frowned a little. “…You’re pretty serious about her, huh?”

“Of course. I…actually asked her to marry me not to long ago.” Sloane’s eyebrows ticked up and he sighed. “But…She didn’t know I was a Grimm at the time and all the weird things that had been happening had taken a toll on us both, so she asked for time. I haven’t brought it up since, because…well, I don’t want to rush her.”

Sloane nodded a bit, looking tempted to say something but just sipped her coffee again.

“I’d like to get back to some training though,” Nick admitted.

She perked up. “Really?”

“Yeah. I mean, I don’t know how often, what with the job and all, but I think it would come in handy. Especially with my occasional…problem…”

Her excitement dimmed back to a bit of worry. “You’re still going pale so to speak?”

“Yeah. But I want to learn more. Maybe it would help work it out?”

She nodded. “I’m fine with that. We’ll figure out a schedule then.”

“Yeah. Better be honest with Juliette too, don’t want her thinking we’re up to anything we shouldn’t be,” he laughed.

Sloane eyed him before sipping again. “You should be so lucky, string bean,” she said, smirking at Nick’s pout as they headed inside.

While the day was mostly quiet, that night they got a call to head out and met at a scene where two men had apparently been mauled by…something. Officer Franco met them at the scene and showed them around. One man was by a car up the street, the other several yards away near a fence, as if he were fleeing from something.

“No wallet,” Nick said after patting him down.

“Neighbor who heard the screams called it in,” Franco said.

“Where's the neighbor?” Hank asked.

“He's in the back of my car. Name's Martinez. He's pretty shook up. I thought he was gonna get sick. And to tell you the truth, I don't blame him.”

“Anybody else hear this?”

“He's the only one willing to talk.”

Sloane frowned. “Is this a rough neighborhood?”

“Well, we get called her more often than we’d like,” Franco said delicately. “There’s good people here, but the bad apples spoil the bunch.”

She nodded in understanding.

“All right, let's get some prints,” Hank said, motioning the crime techs to the car before they walked off towards the police cars. A rather stricken looking Hispanic man was sitting at the back of the car with the door open, rubbing over his beard on occasion and twitching as he tried to calm down. He was wearing a track suit and jacket with a cabbie’s cap on his head.

“Mr. Martinez?” Nick called, getting his attention. “We're Detectives Burkhardt, Larson, and Griffin. We understand you witnessed the attack.”

“No, I only heard it,” he said, shaking his head, trying to stay calm.

“Can you describe what you heard?” Hank asked.

“It was horrible, like they were being torn apart by dogs,” he said, shuddering.

“How long after you heard it did you come outside?”

“Couple of minutes. I just put on some sweats, came out, and saw what happened. The body I mean…”

“You see anybody running from the area?”

“No,” he said, but looked around like a spooked animal.

“Is everything alright?” Sloane asked. “You look a little…antsy still…”

“You worried about something?” Hank asked.

The man swallowed. “Actually, I don't know what I heard.” He quickly stood up, wiping his hands across his pants. “Can I go? I really didn't see anything. I just called 911.”

Sloane frowned but Nick answered first in an exasperated tone. “We may need to contact you later, but, yes, you're free to go.” They watched him march quickly back towards his house and narrowed his eyes. “He's scared.”

“Definitely.”

“Yeah, well, he just saw a guy with his throat ripped out,” Hank pointed out. “Bound to give you some indigestion.”

Nick snorted. “Let's go check out the car.”

They headed to the car near where one victim was killed, similarly bloody and gory like the others. Nick climbed in the passenger seat with gloves on and opened the glove compartment. “Got two wallets,” he said, tossing one out to Hank while he opened the other. “Eddie Otero.” He looked out the car window where one of the bodies laid. “Guessin' that's Eddie.”

“Alfredo Guzman,” Hank said. “Sort of looks like what's left of the other guy. Why put your wallet in the glove box?”

“Might have something to do with what’s back here,” Sloane said from the back seat. “We’ve got two very threatening looking masks.” She held up two masks decorated with painted skulls. “Two even more threatening 9 millimeters.” She gestured to two guns on the seats. “And what appears to be…” She pulled up an old duffle bag. “A bag... Full of money.” She held it open and Nick and Hank eyed it all.

“I'm going out on a limb here and say these boys were up to no good,” Hank said.

“I will join you on that limb,” Sloane agreed.

“So what took them down?” Nick asked.

“And left the money?” Hank queried.

They crawled out of the car as they tried to think things over. “Well, maybe the killer didn't know about the money,” Nick said.

“Why bother killing them then? The hell of it?” Sloane asked.

“He might have got run off before he could come back for it,” Hank pointed out. “Wesen?”

“Wesen like money just as much as anyone else,” Nick said.

“Feral dogs?”

Franco came up before they could continue sousing out the details, saying that a convenience store around the corner had been robbed recently and the call just came in. They quickly headed around the corner on foot, finding the scene wrapped by police tape and a crowd gathered.

“Look, more cops,” someone yelled, and Sloane looked over to see a man with a crew cut and a MARINES t-shirt butting up against the line. “You see what's going on here, right? I mean, you see it? Criminals are taking over the neighborhood and what the hell are you doing about it? Nothing.”

Sloane frowned. “Who's he?”

“David Florez,” an officer at the scene replied. “Local hothead. Whenever we show up, he shows up to tell us how badly we're screwing up.”

“So crime's our fault?” Nick asked, looking annoyed.

“Seems to be,” the officer sighed.

Wu came out of the shop then, having started processing the scene, motioning them through. “Typical stop and rob. Two guys came in waving guns, emptied the register. They wore masks so we're not getting much in the way of a description.”

“Were the masks skulls?” Sloane asked.

“Uhh…yeah,” he said, surprised she knew.

“Then we found them.”

“Wait, what? How?” he asked incredulously.

“We got two bodies around the corner,” Hank said. “Guns, masks, and a bag of money.”

“Somebody killed 'em?” Wu asked. “And left the money behind?”

“We’re confused too, don’t worry,” Sloane stage whispered.

“Who did it?”

“Don't know. It's what we call "a mystery,”” Nick said in a deadpan tone.

“Oh, that's what that is,” Wu said more sarcastically. Sloane’s lips twitched.

“Security cams up?” Hank asked.

“System's in back.”

He led them to the security room and they watched the footage. Sloane glared as she watched them threaten and push around the store clerks, acting cocky and violent. “Not too sympathetic to these guys right now…” she muttered.

“I don’t blame you,” Wu agreed.

“But they were murdered,” Nick sighed. “Which means they were victims and we have to figure out what happened to them.”

They picked out three possible witnesses from the footage: A large rotund man, an elderly woman, and a middle aged man who had all made purchases in the two minutes before the robbery and thus might’ve seen their victims/suspects mask-less outside the store.

Unfortunately the first two were a bust. The large man hadn’t seen anything, and neither had the old lady, who was a bit dramatic about how sorry she was. So it was on to the third.

“As soon as I left the store I got on a bus and headed home,” he said emphatically.

“What bus did you take?” Hank asked.

“The 72,” he said, confused how that made a difference.

“How far was the bus stop from the store?” Nick asked.

“It's just down the street.”

“And did you see anything?” Hank sighed.

“I'm sorry. No. I had to run for the bus.”

“I thought you lived in the neighborhood?” Sloane asked. “Why take the bus?”

“Well, yeah I do. It's only one stop, but I had groceries, so…” he said defensively.

“Did you see any loose dogs on the street?” Nick asked.

He recoiled a little with a frown. “No.”

“There are a lot of kids in the neighborhood and we've got two dead men,” Nick pressed.

“If there are any dangerous animals running around, you should help us do something about it,” Hank added.

The man hesitated before sighing a little. “There's this one guy, ray Bolton,” he said slowly. “He has dogs. I heard he fights 'em on weekends. I know they get out sometimes.” Nick nodded and Sloane copied down the name. “But, look, this guy is... You can't be saying I told you,” he said, obviously scared.

“We won't,” Nick said.

They finished up the interview and separated for the night. Sloane headed not to the motel, but now to the apartment she was now renting. Her things were still piled up in the living room and it was sparse and bare as far as decoration went, but she was for all intents and purposes moved in. She went to take a shower and go to bed, realizing too late she still didn’t have a shower curtain or any actual bedding. Sighing, she decided to deal with it and slept on the bare mattress. It was still more comfortable than her car after all.

In the morning she headed to the station about the same time as Nick, but Hank was already there and plugging away at his computer.

“What you got there?” Nick asked.

“Ray Bolton,” Hank said, still looking at the screen.

“The guy with the dogs?”

“Yeah. Professional bad guy. Convictions for assault, narcotics distribution, and illegal firearms.”

“Sounds like the real salt of the Earth,” Sloane said sarcastically.

“Oh, it gets better. Our two dead guys, Guzman and Otero, are known associates of Bolton,” Hank said with a smile.

“Are we thinking he killed them?” Nick asked.

“Got motive. Guzman testified against him on a narcotics charge last year. Could have turned his dogs on them and got Otero too.”

“Guess we'd better check 'em out,” Nick said.

“Let's get animal control to meet us out there in case Bolton's dogs killed those guys,” Hank added as they headed out to the car.

It was easy to guess which house was Bolton’s. Out front, in plain view, were several chain-link kennels with large dogs in them. The dogs were barking and snarling, jumping on the chain-link in pawing at it in an effort to break free and attack the trespassers. As they walked up with two animal control officers with catch poles, the front door opened and a man with wild hair sporting a snake tattoo on his neck came out. “Who are you?”

“Ray Bolton?” Nick asked. “We're investigating a possible murder. We need to check out your dogs.”

“My dogs didn't do nothing,” Bolton sneered.

“The two victims were old pals of yours, Eddie Otero and Alfredo guzman,” Hank said. “We have reason to believe they were killed by dogs.”

“And they need to be swabbed,” Nick said, motioning for animal control to go ahead.

“Hey, you ain't takin' my dogs,” Bolton said, moving towards them.

Sloane stepped in front of him first, putting a hand up to make him pause. “Yes, we are.”

“And if they weren't involved you get 'em back,” Nick added, though he was fairly certain that wouldn’t be the case.

“So please, step back from the dogs and we’ll talk more about you and your movements the other night,” Sloane said.

Bolton sneered again. “You think they’ll come quietly, bitch?”

Sloane glared, tempted to clock him. Nick had warned her multiple times about what not to do when dealing with suspects however, and striking first was number one. Instead she turned to face the still barking dogs, the Animal Control officers trying to slide a catchpole into one cage with little luck as the dog tried to maul it. Sloane glared at the dogs, gathering up her Grimm energies. She spoke with authority, her voice no more than a calm order. “ _Quiet._ ”

The dogs paused, looking at her, before settling down with soft whines and whimpers. The men present all paused, looking at her in shock, before the Animal Control Officers quickly looped the catchpoles around their necks.

“What the hell did you do to my dogs!?” Bolton roared, woging in front of them. His skin turned leathery, almost scaly, his face and nose becoming a pointed snout, his teeth sharpened into fangs, his eyes turned red, and his ears turned long and pointed near the back of his head like a dog.  

_Oh dammit, a Höllentier!_

His eyes widened when he looked at her. “Grimm!” He lunged and Sloane quick stepped back before grabbing his arm and twisted it hard behind his back. She then threw her weight onto him until he was sprawled on the ground. He woged back but still struggled. “You're not takin' my dogs!” He shouted.

“We're taking your dogs and we're taking you,” Nick said, helping Sloane handcuff him. They hauled him up and marched him towards the police car.

As they did, the man from the convenience store walked up to them. “Hell yeah. Hell yeah! It's about time you got this trash off the street.”

“Him again?” Hank asked as he pushed Bolton’s head down so he crawled into the car.

“Called you 100 times about this dude!” Florez shouted.

“Stay back, sir,” Nick said.

Florez barely listened, trying to weave around to see Bolton in the car. “That's right, lock his ass up.”

“You keep talking, bro. Keep talkin',” Bolton snarled.

Florez said something in Spanish Sloane didn’t catch as they climbed into their cars to head back to the station. Bolton arrived before them, was processed, and put in an interrogation room waiting for them. “So, he is wesen,” Hank said as they walked towards the rooms.

“Yep,” Nick and Sloane said.

“And he knows Sloane is a Grimm now.”

“Yeah. I don’t think he saw me,” Nick said. “I saw him though…”

“What is he?”

“It looked like a cross between a Hundjager and a Damonfeur,” Nick said.

“It’s called a Höllentier,” Sloane said. “If I didn’t see him woge the fact he’s aggressive, fearless, and dumb as a sack a hammers would’ve given it a way…”

“Yeah, he didn’t seem to bothered about you being a Grimm,” Nick recalled.

“They don’t fear anything. Mostly because they’re too stupid. Always jerks, usually career criminals, bottom of the bucket sorts but with nasty teeth and claws.”

“So, possible culprit?” Hank asked.

“Very possible,” she sighed. “We better question him ASAP.” They nodded, heading back to the car nearby.

They drove back to the station and were about to exit the car when Nick caught her shoulder gently.

“Uh, how’d you do the thing with the dogs…?”

“Yeah, I was wondering that too,” Hank said.

Sloane shrugged a little. “Dogs and most other animals are sensitive to wesen presence. Likely that’s how Bolton keeps them in line, or at least from attacking _him_. But that also means they can sense Grimms. Give into the Grimm side a little, they sense it.”

“That’s kind of cool,” Hank said.

“Certainly sounds handy,” Nick said considerately.

“Yeah, I only wish it was 100% effective. It works well on domesticated animals, but wild animals? Last time I tried it, I almost got mauled by a mountain lion…Like, a real mountain lion, not a wesen.”

“Okay, good to know,” Nick said, not sure he wanted to go down that route just yet. “Think you can do the same to him?”

“If he didn’t get scared off seeing me before I doubt it,” she asked blandly as they headed into the room.

Bolton was as defiant as ever, not giving in to any pressure and smiling maliciously as he talked about suing them and that his girlfriend would corroborate his alibi. Nick and Hank looked at each other in frustration and they headed outside.

“That went about as well as I expected with a hollentier,” she sighed.

“We got motive,” Hank said, trying to contain his irritation and failing.

“Yeah, but no evidence to tie him to it,” Nick said.

“If the girlfriend corroborates, and she will, we won't get a warrant.”

Wu walked up then, folder in hand. “Got your report from animal control. Don't think you're gonna like it. Hair and saliva from Bolton's dogs don't match what they found on the bodies. They'd like to take the dogs back, but you got the owner locked up. What do you want me to tell 'em?” he asked, looking between them.

“Tell them the owner assaulted a police officer and we're going to keep him for a while. They should do the same with the dogs,” Hank said.

Wu nodded, though looked a little put out.  “Copy that.” He turned and walked away.

They walked over to a corner near the filing cabinets, Nick speaking quietly. “Bolton is more than capable of killing those guys the way that they were killed.” He looked at Sloane for confirmation.

“Definitely,” she nodded.

“Then he wouldn't have needed his dogs, but the dogs were good cover. We look at the dogs and not him. We should be swabbing him,” Hank said.

“Even if that comes up positive, how do we explain how he did what he did?” Nick asked.

“Let's swab the son of a bitch anyway. I want him to know that we know.”

Sloane smiled. “I like it when you two get fired up.”

“Oh, we’re fired up alright,” Nick said. “But we might need some extra input…”

\--------------------

“No dog did this,” Juliette said, looking over the photos. Sloane had to respect a woman who could look over grisly crime photos while they ate. A strong stomach was an asset she had to develop early on.

“How can you tell?” Nick asked.

“Usually when a dog or coyote or wolf bites down in attack it'll shake the victim and you'd see more tearing in the wounds,” she said.

“Makes sense,” Sloane said, accepting a little more caprese salad from Rosalee. For a dish made of just slices of tomatoes and mozzarella garnished with basil and vinegar, it was good.

“Definitely not a Blutbad, FYI. Too much general mangling. We're more of a throat first and ask questions later wesen. Plus...” He took the photos and flipped through them. “Yeah, there's no signs of going after the legs first to cripple the prey.” Sloane narrowed her eyes, gripping her fork a little tighter while Hank gave him more dubious look. “Sorry. Victim,” Monroe amended. “Which is what a canine would do, so, yeah, you're probably dealing with a wesen and powerful.”

“We know,” Sloane bit out. “It’s a Höllentier.”

“Really?” Rosalee asked. “Bigish eyes, snoutyish, brutish, neanderthalesque…Basically a jerkwad?”

Sloane smirked a little. “Oh yeah. Neighborhood asshole apparently.”

“A Hollentier could definitely do that,” Monroe said, nodding to the pictures.

“What does "hollentier" mean? Is it German?” Juliette asked.

Sloane opened her mouth but Monroe beat her to the punch. “Basically, it means "beast from hell." They actually have a really ancient lineage all the way back to the Egyptians.”

“How did he react to you two?”

“He didn’t see Nick,” Sloane said. “Just me, before I slammed his face in the ground with his arm around his back. As expected though, no fear.”

“Definitely a hollentier then,” Rosalee said, refilling Juliette’s wine. Sloane was drinking tea rather than anything alcoholic.

“This wesen wasn't afraid of you?” Juliette asked in surprise.

“Your basic hollentier is too stupid to know what to be afraid of,” Monroe said. Sloane frowned, not liking that she had said the same exact thing earlier that day. “Which is why the Egyptians used to entomb them with their pharaohs. They thought it was a promotion until, you know, they buried 'em alive.”

She did smile a little at that, enjoying the idea.

“Can somebody pass the, um, what do you call it?” Hank said, pointing at one of the dishes on the coffee table in front of them.

“The artichokes or the Edamame Tabouleh?” Rosalee asked.

“Uh... Both?” he said, shrugging.

Juliette smiled and passed him the bowls. “I have to admit, I don’t normally eat like this,” Sloane said, plucking an artichoke out of the bowl with her fork. “But…not bad.”

Rosalee smiled. “What do you normally eat?”

“A lot of fast food,” Sloane admitted. “I haven’t really cooked in…I guess since high school. Didn’t really have a kitchen since then. And that was more a matter of necessity, Valarie was out most of the time so I had to fend for myself.”

“Valarie?” Nick asked.

“My Grimm mentor. Or master I guess, if you want to go old school.”

“Is she as…intense as you?” Monroe asked.

Sloane gave him a flat look. “No. She’d kill you the second she saw you, Grimm interference or no. Every other wesen in this city too, “harmless” or not.”

“Oh…no offense, hope she doesn’t come here.”

“I hope so too because she’d beat me black and blue and probably break something on me for listening to you all,” she said nonchalantly. Everyone was quiet a moment and she looked up from eating. “…What?”

Rosalee looked at her worriedly. “Did…she do that often?”

“Well yeah. We sparred all the time. Plus the learning curve. I learned how to take a hit pretty early, which was necessary. I remember we had to leave in one night one time because a teacher called CPS when I was twelve and I kept showing up with bruises and a broken arm one time. I mean, heart in the right place, but having a small armory under my bed was going to be hard to explain…Had to learn to hide them better after that.” Everyone was quiet again and Sloane frowned, getting annoyed with the looks now. “What?”

“Um, so…” Juliette said, sensing the need for a new subject. “Where is this Höllentier now?”

 “Uh, we've got him locked up,” Hank said, thankful.

“Hey, you put a pharaoh in there with him he'll stay forever,” Monroe said, snorting with laughter. “Just saying.”

Sloane rolled her eyes and looked at Rosalee in disbelief when she giggled. “You must love him…” she muttered, taking the gentle nudge with Rosalee’s elbow in stride.

It was only a few moments later they got a call about an attack similar to the two men yesterday. This time it was an attempted rape that ended with the assaulter dead. They rushed out, finding it near a road-work area with a lot of brightly colored pylons. The man was tall, with a shaved head, lying flat on his back with his throat ripped out.

“So the guy drags the woman here to assault her, then gets annihilated,” Hank said, looking confused.

“And Bolton's locked up. It wasn't him. We have to let him go,” Nick said in frustration.

“Can't say I'm happy about that.”

“Me neither, but not gonna lie, kind of glad this guy’s dead. Rapists are a special breed of evil in my book,” Sloane said. “I’m glad he didn’t get far this time.”

“Don’t disagree,” Nick said, leaning down to shine his flashlight closer on the victim’s face. “But now we got three vics in the same neighborhood.”

“All bad guys. Seems like we got a vigilante on our hands,” Hank said.

“Vigilante wesen,” Nick corrected.

“Hate to say it, but I’m kind of tempted to let this one go,” Sloane said.

“We can’t let people take justice into their own hands,” Nick said.

“Why? We do it all the time,” she pointed out.

Nick took a breath to argue but then paused, thinking. “That’s…different,” he said defensively.

“Not really. We’re just a little more subtle about it. Well, you are,” Sloane said, looking the victim over as well.

Nick frowned but Hank got between them. “Would the witness have seen him?”

“Possibly,” Nick said. “But even if she did, she wouldn't know what she saw.”

“Don't I know it…” Hank muttered.

Wu came over, getting their attention. “EMTs are through treating Miss Ramos. She's pretty shook up but she's got more to say.” The followed him back through the police tape. Hank looked towards the crowd on the other side of a chain link fence and gave a soft grunt. “Florez is back.”

“Not again,” Nick groaned. Sloane looked and saw the man in question on the other side of the fence glaring at them in chilly judgement.

“Is he doggin' us or does he get here before we do?” Hank asked.

“We should run him and make sure,” Nick suggested, looking to Wu. Wu agreed and walked off to do his thing while they rounded the ambulance to the back. A Hispanic woman sat at the back of the ambulance, a shock blanket over her shoulders. Nick put a hand on Hank’s shoulder to hold him back. “It might be good if Sloane does this one on her own.”

“Me?” Sloane asked.

“She might be more comfortable with a woman after what happened tonight,” Nick said. “You’ll do fine, we’ve been coaching you how to best deal with witnesses. We’ll be in earshot, we just need to know what happened and if she remembers seeing anything.”

“Okay…” she nodded. She turned and walked towards the ambulance. Miss Ramos looked up at her. “Hello. I’m Detective Larson. You’re Miss Ramos?”

“Yes,” she said, nodding slightly. She was calm, or at the very least emotionally drained.

“Do you feel up to answering a few questions?”

She nodded again. “I can.”

“Okay. Did you know your attacker?”

“No,” she shook her head.

“Have you ever seen him around?”

“No.”

Sloane frowned, not sure she was doing well with the one word answers coming her way. She glanced at Nick and Hank but they motioned for her to go on. Turning back, she sighed. “I know this was a very scary night for you, but could you tell me what happened after you got off the bus?”

Ramos shifted, a little more uncomfortable now, but took a deep breath as she remembered. Her accent gave her words a rounded tone. Sloane had noted before this neighborhood had a lot of Hispanic and Latino residents. Bolton stood out as actual white trash among them to be honest. “I walked down the street. I heard someone following me and I turned to look, but he turned away and went down another street. I thought I was being paranoid. That's when he—another man I didn’t see following— attacked me. I tried to scream, but he hit me... And knocked me down and was going to...” She swallowed and blinked her eyes rapidly, moving on quickly. “I don't know what happened next. I'm sorry. It was horrible. Horrible...”

Sloane frowned a little, feeling sympathetic towards her. “Can you describe who killed the man that attacked you?” She looked up at her, a touch of defiance there but also worry. “Even just a small detail will help.” She looked down again and then murmured something softly. Sloane blinked. “I’m sorry, I didn't quite hear you…”

She looked up again. “El Cucuy,” she said a louder.

“I see…is El Cucuy someone’s name? Someone you know?”

“We all know him,” she said. Sloane blinked and tilted her head. “But you may not understand him,” she added, pulling the blanket tighter around her back.

Sloane had a feeling that was all they would get for a while and sighed. “…Do you like chocolate?” Ramos blinked and looked up at her in confusion. Sloane reached into her jacket pocket and pulled out a chocolate chip flavored protein bar. “I don’t always get to eat, so I keep these stashed a lot of places. I know…what you went through was terrifying. Better than some. And you’re probably grateful to this El Cucuy, I definitely understand that. I’m glad it got him before he did anything more to you. We’re just looking for the truth is all, part of our jobs. But…well…sometimes after something goes sideways hard, which it often does for me, chocolate makes me at feel least a little better. So…” Sloane awkwardly offered the bar to her, not sure what else to say.

Ramos slowly reached up and took the bar, looking at it. “…Thank you. I don’t think I can stomach it right now, but…thank you.”

Sloane nodded and handed her a card too. “If you think of anything, or if you ever need help, call me.” She turned, heading the few steps over to Nick and Hank. Nick was looking at her oddly. “What?” she said.

“Nothing, just…that was a nice gesture,” Nick said, not having expected the gift to their victim’s victim.

“I can be nice,” she snapped.

Hank smiled and clapped her on the back as they got to moving back towards the car. “It’s good to see though. But what was that she said?”

“Something about “El Cucuy”,” Sloane said.

“We know what El Cucuy is?” he asked, looking between them as he opened the car doors.

“Not a clue,” Nick said.

“I’m afraid I’m kind of lost too. It sounds Spanish and my expertise in wesen names is German, French, Scandanavian, and a little bit of Japanese.”

“Japanese?” Nick asked.

“I got stranded there for a year when I was 23,” she shrugged. “Had a…falling out with someone and they took my passport and other papers so it took me a bit to get home.”

“That sounds…fun?” he asked curiously.

“Eh, not bad. Learned a lot, got to travel and see some cool stuff, fought some wesen yakuza. Usual tourist stuff.” Nick had to smile a little at the fake humble tone, and  Hank looked mildly impressed as they climbed in. “She said everybody knows it,” Sloane continued, thoughtful.

“Everybody except us,” Nick said, back to his frustration.

“Juliette speaks fluent Spanish. Maybe she knows something,” Hank said.

They jumped when someone pounded on the roof of the car and Florez leaned down with a cocky grin on his face practically pressed against the window. “Now you see that? Somebody doing your job. Cleaning up the streets.”

“Hey! Hey, that's enough. Move on,” Wu said, grabbing him and pulling him from the car as Florez laughed. “Time to go home.”

“Mr. Florez is starting to get on my nerves,” Hank muttered. Sloane had to agree.

\----------------------------

The next day Nick texted her to meet at the trailer that afternoon. Juliette was there as well, and they gave a rundown of what they had found out from a woman named Madame Pilar about El Cucuy. About how her barrio was terrorized by evil men when she was a girl in Guadalajara, and the women crying out for help and justice from “El Cucuy” until the men started turning up dead. And about a woman seeing a creature with yellow eyes, sharp teeth, and fetid breath kill one of the men.

“Not gonna lie, I’m starting to like this creature,” Sloane said. “At the very least we see eye to eye on some things.”

“It’s still murdering people,” Nick reminded her, taking down the books to study.

“Again, so do we. Kind of what we do. Me more so than you, but we both do what we have to in order to make sure other people don’t suffer at the hands of dangerous wesen. This one seems to be making sure people don’t suffer at the hands of dangerous men. I can respect that.”

Nick sighed a little and handed books to her and Juliette to start looking for leads. They began flipping through them, Nick at the table, Sloane on the bed, and Juliette on the floor resting on her stomach. An hour later nick sighed. “I got nothing. You find anything?”

“Lots. This one is about a Grimm who tracked down and beheaded an entire family of Faeteo Fatalis in... whoa, in 1655, who were wreaking havoc in Vlatos on the island of crete,” she said, her eyes bright with interest.

Nick was looking at her fondly but Sloane just nodded a bit sarcastically. “Fun…not really what we’re looking for though.”

“Ah…right. I haven’t found anything that looks or sounds like El Cucuy, no…” she said, sighing as well. “It's a big world, maybe this is just one they haven't encountered yet.”

“Or maybe it's in a book that was never handed down to my relatives. Who knows how much is still out there?”

“I don’t have anything on it either, but considering I didn’t know much about a Volcanalis or a Cracher-Mortel, I can attest to there being surprises or gaps in family collections…” Sloane said.

“Maybe it isn't even wesen,” Juliette said thoughtfully.

“In which case, we are screwed…” Sloane muttered.

They went back to the station to brief Renard on what they’d found out. The would-be rapist, Stephen Stillman, was from Vancouver, WA and had no relation to Guzman, Otero or Bolton to their knowledge. David Florez however lived in the neighborhood with his mother. He was a former Marine who had served three tours in Afghanistan and was diagnosed with PTSD. It was possible he was tired of the rising crime in his neighborhood and decided to do something about it. Wu then came in and showed them footage of the bus the night of Miss Ramos’ attack. They saw Ramos, another man, and Sillman all get off around the same time. Just when they were talking about finding the other man to see if he saw anything, Wu noticed a more familiar face.

“Hey. Don't we know her?”

“Yeah, she was at the convenience store robbery,” Hank said, looking at the woman in the bright red coat and curly, wooly grey hair. “We brought her in for questioning.”

“Mrs. Garcia, right?” Nick asked.

“Yeah, that is her,” Sloane said, frowning a little.

“Same woman at two crime scenes?” Renard questioned.

“In the same area apparently,” Hank said.

“I think you need to talk to her again…”

That’s what brought them to apartment 305 in one of the apartment complexes in the neighborhood. Nick knocked on the door.

“Who is it?” a timid voice asked from inside.

“It's the police, Mrs. Garcia,” he said. “Detectives Burkhardt, Griffin, and Larson. We spoke with you the other night?”

The door opened and the old woman looked at them and then smiled. “Oh, yes. I remember. I-I'm always a little nervous about opening my door after dark. Would you like to come in? I can make you some tea.” She left the door open as she shuffled over to the small kitchenette.

“Actually, we'd like you to come down to the precinct with us,” Nick said, trying to sound as amiable as possible.

“Have I done something wrong?” she asked, nervously fiddling with her electric kettle.

“No, ma'am.”

“You were on the 75 bus last night,” Hank said.

“Yes, I was. How did you know?” she asked in surprise.

“There are surveillance cameras on the buses.”

“Oh…” She put the kettle pot back down. “Can... can I ask you what this is about?”

“We'd rather ask you a few questions at the precinct. There's some photos we'd like you to look at,” Nick said.

“Oh, yes. Well, of course, if you need me to. I'll just get my coat,” she said, smiling as she shuffled over to her coat rack.

“I’m not sure about this,” Sloane said. “I mean, she wasn’t much help the first time…”

The boys nodded in agreement, but it was their best lead at the moment. They headed out once she had her coat on and her purse over her shoulder. She took Nick’s arm with a smile after closing the door. “Oh. I hope you don't mind, but I don't get many handsome young men visitors anymore.” He smiled good natured, if a little awkwardly.

Sloane smirked a little and whispered. “I won’t tell Juliette, don’t worry.”

Nick shot her a glare as they headed down to the car. It started raining as they climbed in, Sloane sitting with Mrs. Garcia in back. They started right for the station.

“Oh. This is a nice car,” she said, admiring the interior. “I bet it's fast.”

“When it has to be,” Hank said, smiling a little at the review mirror when she chuckled.

Nick’s cellphone rang and he picked it up. “Burkhardt.” He listened to the other end, looking serious at the end. “Meet us there. We can try to intercept him.” He hanged up and looked at Hank and Sloane. “We got a problem with Florez. Apparently he's pretty upset that we let Bolton go.”

“I wasn’t too keen on the idea either,” Sloane said.

“His mom called it in, thinks he might be going after Bolton.”

“Then we better go,” Hank sighed. “Sorry, Mrs. Garcia. But we're gonna have to make a detour.”

“Oh, no problem,” she said, smiling kindly. “Whatever you need to do. It sounds very exciting.”

They raced to Bolton’s house as fast as the car could safely go in the misting rain. When they pulled up, they could see Bolton wailing on Florez in his front yard, the dogs going nuts in their kennels. Nick and Sloane were out of the car before it had completely stopped, rushing over.

“Stop! Police!” Nick yelled. He wrenched Bolton off of him and the man stood with his hands up.

“Hey, he came on my property with that knife. This is self-defense.”

“Get back in your house,” Nick said.

“Arrest him. I'm pressing charges, man. He tried to kill me!” he shouted.

“Get in the house or we'll arrest you.”

“I’d do worse than that,” Sloane said darkly. Bolton glared but turned to go back inside.

The dogs kept barking as they went over to a prone, bloody, but still conscious Florez. “Let's call an ambulance,” Nick said, helping him up with Hank on the other side.

“You shouldn't have let him go, man,” Florez slurred through a bruised and splotchy face. “Shouldn't have let him go.”

“I don’t disagree, but look where this got you and your mother,” Sloane said. They paused at the car when they saw they were missing one little old Hispanic woman in the back seat. “Where’d Mrs. Garcia go?”

“She’s not here,” Nick said, looking around wildly. Only her red coat was in the back seat. A beat later they heard a loud, terrified scream come from inside the house. Sloane was off and running with Nick close behind, shouting back to Hank to stay with Florez. Nick made Sloane pause at the door, drawing his flashlight and his gun. Sloane drew her knife and he opened the door, walking in with her at his side. They could see yellow eyes and sharp teeth, and bloody claws as they swiped at Bolton’s neck repeatedly. He was already dead, but the creature was unleashing a fury on him still. But then it paused, one ear ticking back their direction, knowing they were behind it.

“Back away,” Nick ordered.

The creature stood, looking at them. Sloane recognized the floral shirt and dusty pink cardigan immediately, even stained with blood, and sure enough the creature turned back into Mrs. Garcia with wide, shocked eyes. “Ay, Chihuahua. You're Grimms? I had no idea…”

Nick and Sloane gaped, glancing at each other, and then back to her. This was not how they saw this going, that was for sure.

It was a whirlwind of sound and lights afterwards—police cars, ambulances, neighbors freaking out, Florez’s mother crying and beating him with a sandal and yelling at him in Spanish while he cowered and said he was sorry—before they had a quiet moment. It was a tense quiet moment in the interrogation room. The three detectives sat across from Mrs. Garcia, who was still covered in blood and looking sheepishly between them.

“You're 77 years old,” Hank finally said after several minutes.

She smiled and chuckled. “Last month.”

“You killed Guzman and Otero,” Nick said, leveling an accusing finger at her.

“And Stillman, who attacked Ms. Ramos under the bridge,” Hank added.

“I know it looks bad, but do you really think anyone is going to believe that I could do such things?” she asked, shrugging innocently.

“You're El Cucuy,” Sloane said, the least worked up of the detectives.

“I've been called many things,” she said dismissively.

“You have Bolton's blood all over you,” Hank pointed out.

“Well, yes, you brought me to Mr. Bolton's house. And I heard the terrible screaming, I went in to help. Oh, I must have gotten all bloody when I tried to save him,” she said, dabbing at the blood with mock concern.

“"Save him"? Really?” Nick asked incredulously.

“Oh, you don't need to worry about me anymore,” she said in exasperation. “I have done what I came to do. The neighborhood is safe again. And I-I really should be moving on.”

“You really think we can just let you go?” Nick asked, shocked at her strangely innocent brazenness.

“Well, I don't think you have any choice,” she said, laughing gently.

The detectives looked at one another, Nick and Hank floundering a moment before they all rose and headed to the observation room. Renard looked at them equally askance. “Are you kidding me?” Nick and Hank shrugged helplessly. It was true, they had no way to prove she did it. And who would believe a 77 year old woman killed a fit, thirty something man with her bare hands with that much blood? Sloane looked through the glass, noting how her eyes seemed to glow and her head was cocked as if she was listening to something. It seemed by move on, she had more work to do.

An hour later, Mrs. Garcia was heading down the steps of the station in a clean, borrowed shirt. Sloane was leaning against the side, looking at her as she came down. “Ah, the Lady Grimm,” she said. “Have you come to try and hunt me?” She looked more amused than anything, though there was a flicker of doubt in her eyes.

Sloane regarded her a moment before reaching into her pocket and holding out another protein bar. “You like chocolate? Little snack for the road.”

Mrs. Garcia blinked before smiling and taking the offered treat. “You have killed many…”

“I had to,” she said.

“Perhaps. Perhaps not. Yet, I see what you don’t wish to acknowledge deep down.”

Sloane frowned, stuffing her hands in her pockets. “And what’s that?”

“Doubt,” she answered simply.

“What would I doubt?” she snapped.

“That’s what you have to figure out for yourself. But I know, deep down, you have done what you’ve done out of your own sense of justice and because you wanted to protect others from the pain you have felt…there is vengeance there too, but, I cannot fault that all things considered,” she smiled. “In all, while not innocent, I don’t see you as someone who must be…pushed out from this world.”

Sloane narrowed her eyes suspiciously. “And how do you figure all that?”

She gestured to herself as if it were obvious. “I am “El Cucuy”. I don’t just catch people as they commit evil acts. It is an aroma, a feeling I get when I see others. I see much of their inner most parts. It’s how I knew to follow that would-be rapist. I could sense his intent.”

Sloane eased back a little but folded her arms. “I have no reason to have doubts. I just happen to think that as far as wesen go…you’re one I could maybe stand to let go.”

“Ah, a Grimm’s approval? Now that is rare…” she chuckled.

Sloane shrugged. “At the very least you have a sense of justice.”

Mrs. Garcia smiled, putting the protein bar in her purse. “That is, at times, all I have. I must always be on the move. You were much the same, I sense…but perhaps not anymore.”

“Not by choice,” Sloane huffed.

“I wonder about that…” She tottered down the remaining steps, glancing back at Sloane. “I hope you figure out what you really want soon, _mija_.” She then headed on down the street and Sloane frowned after her but didn’t follow.

\--------------------------

_Stories we Tell our Young_

\--------------------------

Nick should’ve realize “be careful what you wish for” was a lesson he should learn. It’d been quite a while since they’d done some Grimm training together, and he’d asked for this. But he should’ve realized Sloane had a long memory.

Nick met Sloane at the usual place in the woods one afternoon after work, thinking he had an idea what was going to happen. It was now November, and it was chilly, but Sloane was dressed just in a long sleeve thermal shirt and jeans. Her jacket was sitting on top of a box nearby.

 “Okay. What’s today? Clubs? Hide and Seek?” he said, rubbing his hands together.

She smiled, amused it seemed and anticipating his reaction. “Knife throwing,” she said.

Nick blinked and faltered. “Kn-Knife throwing?!”

She smiled at his dropped jaw. “Hey, you said last time you wanted to kick it up a notch. So—” She pulled out a rolled up bit of material and unfurled it, revealing several nasty looking knives. “I’ll show you how to throw knives. That is if you don’t know already.”

Nick tried not to look nervous. “Um…no, actually, not really. You, uh, took me seriously.”

“Considering it was something we argued over, yes. Now you’ll learn something then.” She handed him the roll of knives for him to look at while she set other things up. They looked very sharp, and also plain. All metal, no wood, their handles having several holes in them that he supposed were for handling. “Now…My mentor taught me this using animal carcasses and then later live wesen on hunts-”

“Oh my God, no,” he said immediately, ready to fight her even as his mind was trying to process that.

“…But I figured your delicate sensibilities wouldn’t like that. So here.” She flipped up a large piece of thick wood nailed to a stand by putting her foot on the stand. “I made you a practice target that won’t move or bleed.”

“Oh…that’s…Sloane…” he finished in an exasperated groan when he saw what the target looked like.

She grinned. “Yes?”

“Did you draw the target?” he asked, though he already knew she must have.

“I did. Why? You don’t like it?” she asked innocently.

Nick sighed. The target was a very detailed sketch of a blutbad in black paint. Bullseyes were painted over the head, neck, heart, stomach, hands, knees and groin in red, as well as a pair of red eyes. Perhaps he could forgive that, but also painted on was—“Was the plaid shirt necessary?”

“I think it lends an air of authenticity…though I admit, plaid is really hard to draw, especially with all the wrinkles on the shirt. But I think I did okay—”

“Next time, don’t bother with that much detail,” he said.

She rolled her eyes. “Don’t tell me your bleeding heart won’t let you attack a generic blutbad on a piece of wood? Just remember it’s not your friend and just a stranger trying to rip your throat.” She walked over and took the knives back. “These are in fact throwing knives. Aerodynamic, light, and simple. That is pine,” she pointed to the target. “Soft wood, best to practice with. More like normal skin and flesh. What we’re looking for is accuracy. I’ll teach you basic stance, hold, and release and we’ll tweak it until you’re hitting more than missing. Then you can learn some fancier tricks.”

He nodded slowly. He forgot that while headstrong and quick tempered, Sloane wasn’t a bad teacher. She did take time to explain things to him.

 “Great. So, basic stance.” She pulled a knife out to demonstrate. “Relax your body. This isn’t brain surgery. Stress comes later, if you’re actually trying to hit a moving and breathing target. For now…think of it as stress relief. It’s meditative and you do it till its second nature. Stand up straight for a better, more accurate, throw. Place your right foot forward with the left foot slightly behind-”

“That’s not what you’re doing.”

“I’m left handed dominantly, though I can use both pretty well, so I go the other way. You’re right handed. Now pay attention. There are two ways to throw a knife: by the handle or by the blade. And the technique is decided by the knife. You’ll want to throw the heavy end first to achieve more force going into your target. These you throw by the handle. Hunting knives by the blade. Now there are different grips I’ll teach you, but I favor the pinch grip because I don’t want to cut my own fingers off in the heat of the moment, though you lose a little power.” She pinched the end between her thumb and curved forefinger. “Now…ever play baseball?”

“Uh, a little when I was younger,” he said with a bit of surprise.

“It’s a lot like pitching, or so I’m told. Square your shoulders toward your target, and assume your stance. Grip your knife and raise it as if you are about to hammer a nail into a wall at eye level in front of you. Reach back, and step into a moderate throw. Don’t try to throw it as hard as you can. Simply release the knife when it’s out in front of you. Don’t snap your wrist either. Follow through as you would on a baseball throw.” She demonstrated slowly and Nick nodded as he watched. “So when you release…” She suddenly did it quickly and Nick jumped when he hear the thunk and looked to see the knife in the target’s chest yards away. “You strike them out.”

“Ah…”

“Want to give it a shot?”

“Sure…” He took one of the knives, looking it over critically.

“Don’t worry, you can’t do as bad as I did my first time”

“Really? I would’ve thought you were a natural at all things lethal,” he said mostly seriously.

“Eh, most Grimms are. I expect you’ll adapt to this pretty fast. But my first time I ended up fumbling the knife and cut up my fingers…then the knife slipped and I nearly struck my mentor when I tried throwing it because of the blood.”

Nick grimaced. “Yeesh…”

“Yeah…so, um, I’ll be standing behind you and to the side. Give it a shot.”

Nick had to snort a little laugh at that. He took a stance, Sloane helping make a few minor adjustments and reminding him to relax, before he gave it a try. It managed to land just to the side of the target, still in the wood but not a direct hit.

“Not bad. No blood on either end,” she said.

Nick pulled another knife and looked at it. “You really kept practicing the first day with bloody, cut up fingers?”

“My mentor insisted. Gotta learn to deal with pain and keep fighting somehow, might as well do it when you’re ten,” she said matter-of-factly.

Nick looked at her in surprise, lowering the knife a little. “Ten? You started this when you were ten?”

“Uh…yeah. I started seeing wesen when I was nine. Few months of initial training, hand to hand techniques and such, and then weapons training. That’s how my mentor did it. I figured you were ready for it now.”

He was still reeling a bit, staring at her. _Ten years old and she was learning how to throw knives…possibly at living targets…So this is all just normal for her…_

“What? Keep going, give it a few more tries before you quit,” she said, looking for the entire world like nothing was wrong.

“Not quitting, just…Nothing.” He had no idea how to talk about that and decided to let it drop for now. He continued giving throws with Sloane occasionally correcting him or giving tips, before stopping when I started getting dark. “I think we should probably stop.”

“Agreed. Training in the dark is another lesson.” Nick helped retrieve the knives from the board as Sloane put them in their pack. He hissed when his finger skirted over one blade and put his finger to his mouth. He turned when he heard a bark of laughter. “You throw the knives with no injuries, but manage to cut yourself in the last inning.”

Nick blushed a bit, having been rather proud he hadn’t cut himself as well. He grabbed the knife properly and took it out as he walked out. “I wasn’t doing terribly at least…got a couple of hits.”

“No killing blows, but I admit you had some good blows to the knees that would cripple them and a good shot to the groin at one point that made me chuckle. Here, little act of mercy I never got.” He was surprised when she held out a Band-Aid to him.

“Oh…uh, thanks.” He moved to take it, but she shook her head.

“Wait a second,” she ordered and he paused. She took his hand and ran water from her water bottle over it to wash off the cascading blood, then fitted an old handkerchief over it. “Hold that for thirty seconds.” He blinked but did so, waiting for the blood to clot. She grabbed a jar out of her bag and opened it in the meantime. When he took the cloth away, she smeared a little of the concoction inside on his finger. “This is that old Grimm salve recipe I think I mentioned. …I actually showed Rosalee how to make it, and I’ll show you too if you want. It’ll heal a little cut like this by tomorrow if you keep it covered.”

Nick was surprised and finished opening the Band-Aid to fit around his finger. “Thanks…”

“Always be prepared, the Grimm motto.”

“I…think that’s the Boy Scouts actually,” he said slowly, not sure if he was supposed to laugh.

“They are little plagiarists and if we could sue them, we would,” Sloane said mock seriously. Nick had to snort a laugh again at that. She finished putting up the knives, rolled up the cloth case and tied it. “Mind if we leave the target for now?”

“I guess not, this area is usually pretty secluded.”

“I had a feeling. Glad I chose it then.” They hiked back towards their cars. “I’ll call you later about the next lesson.”

“Okay. Uh, Sloane?”

“Yeah?”

“That…was actually kind of fun. And, um…so are the “Grimm Games”. Sorry if I didn’t seem appreciative or like I enjoyed them, I know you’re trying to make sure I’m prepared.”

Sloane looked surprised now before nodding a little. “I admit, it was a little… disappointing. I was trying to do things in a way I thought you’d prefer since you don’t want to actively hunt down a wesen. This was also…well, how my grandmother started training me.”

“Really? So…was she your mentor at first?”

She shook her head. “No, not exactly. I didn’t know I was a Grimm when we started training, or that she was one. I didn’t know anything about wesen. We owned a lot of land and…I just thought they were games. Hide and seek in the forest, capture the flag, dueling…They were…fun. I guess I wanted to try and revisit those first for basic skills…” She looked at the throwing knives. “Deidre was…more efficient. She didn’t really approve of games, said I need to toughen up because life wasn’t going to be a game anymore…” She frowned. “I guess…they are a waste of time really. We’re grown, games aren’t necessary to learn things anymore.”

Nick frowned. “Sloane, I didn’t mean-”

“No, really, it’s true. I’ll think up more hands on lessons like this.” She opened her car door. “Talk to you later.”

“Sloane-”

She closed the door and started the car and Nick sighed as she drove off.

\--------------------------

The next day, Nick was trying to think how to talk to Sloane at the station. They’d been having a good time, actually getting along, and he felt like he’d stepped on that. Or really, that he’d stepped on a land mine. He forgot, with how she liked the hunt and seemed to not let anything effect her, she was still a person who had been through a lot of traumatizing things since she was a child. Hank seemed to sense the odd atmosphere between them, though Sloane herself seemed perfectly fine. Before he could get his thoughts together though, Renard messaged them that he wanted to see them. All three rose and headed to his office, seeing him packing up his briefcase.

“You wanted to see us?” Hank asked.

“Yeah. I’m going to be leaving town for a little while,” Renard said.

“Vacation?” Nick asked.

“That's what I'd like everyone to think. Captain Harden will take over while I'm away.”

“Is he…?” Sloane started.

“No, he’s not in with the whole Grimm thing as far as I know, so best keep that under wraps.”

She sighed but nodded.

“Does this have to do with your brother's death?” Nick asked.

“Maybe. Now if you receive any communication from me while I'm away... text, email, otherwise... just ignore it. It won't be me. If I do need to contact you, I'll do it indirectly through Rosalee.”

“Rosalee?” Sloane asked, confused and maybe a little wary of him using her.

“No one would be aware of her as a contact of mine, and she agreed when I asked. Don’t worry, I’ve covered the tracks and I’ll be careful if I do need to contact her.”

“You in some kind of danger?” Hank asked, a little worried.

“I would assume so,” Renard sighed, heading past them towards the door.

“Is there anything we can do here?” Nick asked.

He paused at the door and nodded. “Yeah, if anyone asks, I'm having a wonderful time in Tahiti.”

He left and the three detectives looked at one another doubtfully before returning to their desks. Sloane looked at the time and sighed. “You guys want some coffee from that place on the corner? I think I need a caffeine boost.”

“Oh, that sounds awesome,” Hank sighed, grabbing his wallet and handing her cash.

“The usual?”

“Yes please,” Nick did the same and she headed off for the door. Nick thought about catching up to her to talk but sighed, still uncertain what to say. Hank noticed and frowned.

“Did you want something different?”

“What? No, it’s not like that…I just…I think I hurt Sloane’s feelings yesterday…” he said slowly.

Hank blinked, tilting his head slightly. “How? I mean, I know she must have them, but she seems pretty tough…”

“We started training again,” Nick explained. “And before it was…kind of like games. I mean, we did regular sparring sort of things with hand to hand and weapons, but then we’d do these things to practice tracking and hunting. Like she’d give me a padded bat, she’d have another, we’d walk fifty paces in the opposite direction and then we’d have to work on hunting each other while staying hidden. Or we’d each have a flag or something and we’d have to hide it somewhere and then go find the other person’s flag before they got ours.”

“Sounds fun,” Hank said. “Kind of like team building exercises they make us do at those retreats.”

“Yeah. But I…guess it’s not what I expected from her. I commented on that before the whole Zombie thing. It…started an argument. I thought she was going soft on me, she said it was to ease me into it. She remembered that and so this time, so she started teaching me knife throwing.”

“Knife throwing?” he asked, a bit incredulously.

“Yeah. It was pretty interesting actually. She’s…not bad at teaching that sort of stuff. But then I said some stuff after about it, about the games again and she…talked about how she was trained.” Nick frowned a little. “She talked about learning to throw knives when she was _ten._ ”

“Ten?” Hank asked even more incredulously.

“And about how she cut up her fingers but her mentor, this…Deidre made her keep practicing with bleeding fingers. Didn’t even let her put a Band-Aid on it, at least that’s what she said when she gave me one...”

“Damn…”

“Yeah. So…I kind of get why she’s the way she is a bit more now…She had to stop being a kid really abruptly, and then she was having fun I think playing these old-school games that apparently her grandmother did with her. And then I put my foot in my mouth and made her doubt them so now she says we’ll just forget about them and do more “hands on” stuff.”

“And you feel like a jerk for interrupting her happier trip down memory lane?” Hank surmised.

“Yeah…”

“Well, talk to her about it,” Hank said honestly. “You aren’t going to get anywhere tiptoeing around, especially with her I think.”

“Yeah…I just wish she was easier to talk to…”

“Hey, I’ve thought that in some of my marriages,” Hank chuckled. “All I know is it wasn’t them stopping me from talking to them, it was me.”

Nick sighed and nodded a bit, starting to think over what he had to say.

He didn’t really get the chance to say anything until later in the afternoon. Sloane brought the coffee and they sat to continue their paperwork from their last few cases. It was only as they were moving to leave for the day he caught up to her near the garage. “Hey, Sloane? Uh…do you want to um…do some training?”

Sloane quirked her eyebrows. “Now?”

“Yeah, I mean…a little afternoon and evening training wouldn’t be bad, right?” He said lamely.

“…Okay, sure. Meet you at the same place?” she said, shrugging.

Nick smiled. “Yeah, see you there.”

They headed to their cars and drove over to the spot in the woods. They walked down to the small clearing and Sloane sighed as she looked up at the waning sun. “It’s getting a bit too dark to practice with the knives again…I guess we can do some hand to hand?”

“Oh, uh…” Nick realized he hadn’t specified he wanted to do some of the other exercises, the kind she’d done as a kid. She was looking at him, waiting for a response and getting impatient, and he wasn’t sure what to say still after the last time. “Yeah, that sounds good.”

She nodded, taking off her jacket and tossing it over a nearby branch. Nick took off his as well, the November chill sharp against his skin, giving him goose-flesh. But they took their places in the middle of the clearing. “Go easy on me.”

“You won’t learn anything if I do,” she said, bringing her arms up. Nick brought his up as well and they eyed each other for a moment.

Sloane made the first move, throwing a punch toward him, which he managed to deflect, but she was already following through from the other hand. He managed to dodge back and tried to bring his own fist up to get out of the defensive, but she side stepped him and threw him off balance with a foot to his instep.

Things went like that for several moments, Sloane keeping him mostly, frustratingly, on the defensive. Now he got an idea of how she hunted—any openings she had felt short and taunting. If he moved for them she was already closing them and moving to strike. If he hesitated to think, she moved in at just the moment. They were avoiding the head and face, unlike a real fight, but he was getting hit fairly good in the chest and abdomen.

“You can do better than this,” Sloane said, eyeing him.

“I thought this was just a friendly match?” he said.

“Doesn’t mean you shouldn’t try to win. Do I need to get more serious?”

“Uh, well-” He gasped when she moved to hit his shoulder and tried to dodge back. “Sloane, whoa, hold up-”

“Not letting up. Show me what you got!” She struck him harder then in the stomach and he oofed and doubled over. Staring down at the ground, he felt his mind go blank.

“…Nick? Hey, I didn’t hit that hard…” She said, moving towards him. She paused when he groaned—not in pain, but in something more guttural and primal. “Nick?” He looked up and Sloane felt a bit of dread creep up her spine. Nick was pale as a corpse, with dark eyes ringed in red. She hadn’t seen him like this since the zombie incident. Growling at her, he lunged and Sloane tried to back away quickly. “Nick! Whoa, stop!”

He growled again, making a swipe for her. There was enough force behind it he’d take her down if she got hit, and she had to drop down to avoid it completely. Sliding over the lives a little, she got stood and backpedaled quickly as he kept coming for her. He kept moving for her, his footfalls hard and angry. She deflected one swipe, but he wasn’t hesitating now and before she could duck again he had his hands around her throat. “Nick!” she gasped. He squeezed and she fought for breath. He was lifting her as he tightened his grip, her feet barely touching the ground as she gasped tried to pry his hands off. “S-stop…Nick…” Her words were barely more than air leaving her lips. Her vision was starting to darken. It was just with her last bit of strength she managed to clap her hands over his ears as hard as she could; a move meant to disorient by applying sudden pressure to the eardrums.

Nick gasped and let go. Sloane couldn’t even land on her feet, she dropped to her knees as she coughed from her chest and took deep gulps of air. Nick blinked, his color coming back and his eyes clearing. “…Sloane?”

She looked up at him, glaring slightly as she stood. “In you’re right mind now?” she croaked.

“I…oh God…what did I do?” he said, eyeing her with wide, frightened eyes.

“You…had your hands around my neck for a good bit there,” she said, trying to calm down.

“I-I had my—I tried to choke you?!” he gaped.

“Strangle I think is the appropriate word,” she sighed, rubbing over her neck. “Almost succeeded…”

“Oh my God…Sloane, I am so…so sorry, I swear I didn’t…

She looked at him again and sighed. “No…it’s pretty obvious you weren’t in control…it was like before, when you were drugged by the Cracher Mortel.”

Nick looked down slightly, his brow knit in concern. “That’s…what Juliette said was happening too…and…It’s happened other times. Like underwater with Ellie…or during fights.”

“…Let’s go sit for a bit and talk.” Sloane grabbed her jacket and Nicks’ to toss to him. They hiked back up to their cars, both quiet and thinking. Nick climbed into Sloane’s passenger seat while she sat in the drivers, turning on the car to get the heater going. The radio came on to a classic rock station, but she turned it down immediately. Taking a deep breath she looked at him. “So…this keeps happening?”

“Yeah…” Nick nodded. “It’s…random. Like, I’m guessing that self-preservation is a big factor, but…then it happens when I sleep sometimes according to Juliette.”

“You mentioned that…she says you look “dead”?” Sloane said delicately.

“Yeah. Not really breathing, pale…”

Sloane took a deep breath. “…I don’t know what this is. But I know where I can get some information. Here in Portland.”

Nick looked up hopefully. “Really?”

“Yeah. I can’t guarantee anything though, but at least I can put the question out there and we can see if we get anything in.

“I’d really appreciate it…” he said honestly.

Sloane sighed and looked thoughtful. “I might bring you with me, but since you’ve never been before I gotta kind of…warn the people in charge. Give me a couple of days and I’ll see if we can make an appointment.”

“Okay…” Nick glanced to her neck and frowned. “Y…you’re going to have bruises…”

She patted her neck softly and sighed. “Probably…The cream doesn’t work on bruises, just open wounds. I’ll wear a scarf for a bit, no big deal. Not the first time.”

“I…I could’ve killed you, Sloane…” he said quietly.

“…I wasn’t going to let you. Boxing your ears was my first choice, my second was significantly lower,” she said with a smirk, trying to break the tension.

Nick tried to smile, but it wasn’t quite there. “Well…thanks for going easy on me after all?”

“Yeah. But we should probably end for tonight.”

“Yeah…” he agreed. “I…this isn’t really what I intended when I asked for training.”

“I would hope you weren’t intending it,” she said honestly and a little cooly. “I thought we were starting to get along.”

“No, we are,” he said quickly. “I just…” He sighed. “I wanted to do the training we did before. The games you started with.”

Sloane blinked and arched her eyebrow. “Really? Why?”

“I…they were fun?” he said lamely.

She still looked unsure and then shook her head. “This isn’t about fun. It’s about training. But we should put that all on hold for a bit…”

“Yeah…right, probably good with all this going on,” he said, nodding.

“You head out, I’m going to make some calls.”

He nodded, opening up the door and heading to his own car, guilt, worry and disappointment warring inside him. He headed home, the sun setting below the horizon as he drove in quiet. When he got to his house, he walked in quietly as he could. He wasn’t sure he was up to talking just yet.

“Nick?”

He sighed quietly, and looked over towards the kitchen. “Yeah, it’s me.”

“Everything okay? I thought you and Sloane were doing some training?” She stepped out to look at him, smiling happily but a little confused.

“Yeah, we did. But we, uh…decided daylight was better.” It wasn’t technically a lie.

“Okay…Well, I just started dinner, it’ll be just a bit.”

He nodded, not quite looking at her. “Thanks. I’m gonna go clean up.”

“Sounds good,” she said with a smile, turning to head back in. Nick headed to their bathroom to wash his hands. He paused watching the water wash over them and turned them slowly. He couldn’t remember it clearly, but he could almost feel the column of a throat between them. He felt bile come up in his throat and he quickly cupped his hands and splashed his face with water to try and reset his brain. Breathing deeply, he shut the water off and patted down his face with a towel while he tried to think about what to do.

\--------------------------

Sloane headed back to her own house, not trusting the signal out in the woods completely. She also wanted to grab food on the way home, though she wasn’t terribly hungry. She ate fairly quickly, just a simple sandwich and some water. After that she paced for a bit as she tried to think on what to do exactly. Contacting Kelly was an option—but not one she favored. Wherever she was it was doing something important. Distracting her could have fatal consequences.

So her real option, that she also didn’t want to do, was another call. She went to the rolodex in her office and flipped through to an unmarked list of contacts—just numbers and last names, with state abbreviations next to them. Sitting at the desk she took a breath and dialed the number.

“Yes?”

“Gallin?” Sloane asked, trying not to sound unsure.

“Sloane Larson?” The voice was feminine but husky. “What prompts this call? More odd weapons?”

“No, not exactly. I have…or rather, I know someone that has an issue. Another Grimm.”

They chuckled. “Of course, I don’t handle much else.”

“ But they haven’t been introduced to this side of things yet,” she added.

“Oh, he’s green?”

“He’s…had to figure a lot out on his own. He’s Marie Kessler’s nephew. Kelly’s son.”

“Oh,” they gasped. “That’s quite a legacy then.”

“Yeah. I’m helping to get him a bit more settled into our world, Marie didn’t really get a chance to and Kelly…”

“Yeah,” she sighed.  “I know the story there, mostly. Is the a local?”

“Right, rooted here in Portland.”

“And he’s the one that had some kind of fire wesen you needed those extinguishing grenades for?”

“Yes He gets into…interesting situations,” she sighed.

“I take it he’s in another?” Gallin said amused.

“Yes. There was an incident with another wesen last month. He was poisoned. He lived but there’s some adverse side effects that are not doing us any favors…”

“What kind of wesen?”

“A Cracher Mortal.”

“Wow, that is not something we see over this side of the states often. They tend to prefer more water locked, humid climes,” they said, surprised.

“Well, I’m glad you know what it is because I had no damn clue when it came up. Has this happened before?”

“To a Grimm? Mmm, more than likely, but I’m not sure. I’ll have to search the records and ask around. It’ll take me at least a week, maybe two to get it all.”

“Well, we’d appreciate that.”

“It would be best if you brought him in so I can take some samples. If it is new, we’ll need to look into it.”

“He’s a cop, I’ll see about when I can bring him to you.”

“Alright. Until then try to stay safe.”

“Don’t I always?” She ended the call and sighed a bit. It was earlier than she wanted to show Nick this side of things, but she supposed there was no real harm in it.

When her phone rang in her hand she jumped a little and looked at the screen. Frowning, she answered it. “Hank?”

“Hey. Sorry to disturb you, but we got a case,” he said.

“No disturbance, I could use the distraction I think,” she sighed.

“Everything okay?”

“Yeah…fine, just trying to work something out. Did you call Nick?”

“Yeah, he’s on his way. The Church of the Blessed Sacrament.”

That got her attention. “Someone got offed in a church?”

“Little blunt, but yeah…The priest.”

“Yikes,” she muttered. “Okay, I’ll be there soon. Blasted Sacrement.”

“ _Blessed,_ Blessed Sacrament,” he said meaningfully.

Sloane smirked. “Just kidding. See you there.” She shut off the phone and sighed before touching her neck. It was sore, and she knew it would be bruising soon. Going to her closet, she grabbed the gray and blue scarf and wrapped it around her neck. As cold as it was, no one would question it.

Sloane pulled up to the church, flashed her badge and walked in. Wu nodded and gestured her over from the doorway near the back. Nick and Hank were inside looking over the scene and nodded to her when she walked up. Nick glanced at the scarf and got a guilty look over his face, but didn’t point it out. “Hey. Sorry to call you back in,” Hank said.

“Not a problem, really. Catch me up?”

“Dead priest, Monsignor Paul,” he nodded to the body of an old man lying prone on the floor. “His seminary student was injured, taken to a hospital. And we have a missing child, Daniel Keary.”

“Missing child?” Sloane asked in surprise and a touch of worry. “What in the heck was going on?”

“According to the parents…an exorcism.”

“…This town is freaking weird…” she muttered, walking into the room. “Any idea what really happened?”

“Still trying to figure that out,” Hank said. “We-”

“Wait, do you hear that?” Nick interrupted, looking around the room. Sloane frowned, not hearing anything immediately, but she tapped into her Grimm senses quickly enough and listened intently. She could hear what sounded like shuffling and breathing coming from…the altar? She looked at Nick and nodded to it, Nick nodding back as he walked over to it. He examined the altar slowly, moving his hand over a panel until he pushed in at one point and it popped open. Opening it slowly, he looked both relived and worried inside of it. “Daniel...? I'm Detective Burkhardt. You okay?” Sloane moved around so she could peak inside. A boy, dark haired with pale skin that stood out even more with the dark navy and red of his sweater and the gold of a tasseled rope wrapped around his wrist, looked back at them with wide eyes. Sloane felt cold a moment, her mind going back involuntarily to being just about his age and hiding in a cupboard while she heard growls and screams and smelled blood…shaking her head, she focused back on the present. “You're safe now,” Nick was saying. “You wanna come out?” Daniel shook his head. “Your parents are in the other room. You want them to come in here?” Nick asked, still gentle. Daniel nodded and Nick looked to Hank.

“I'll get them,” he said, going back out of the room.

Nick looked back to Daniel. “You wanna tell me what happened?” More head shaking. “Did those men hurt you?” Still more head shaking. “All right, I'm gonna untie that rope from around your wrist, okay? Okay.” Nick unwound the rope and Wu handed him an evidence bag for it. Just after it was bagged, a blonde woman and a tall man walked in.

“Mom!” Daniel said, scrambling out of the altar and over to her, hugging her. She hugged him back, shocked but relieved.

Nick glanced over to the body on the floor and Sloane was already moving as he spoke. “I wanna make sure that he doesn't see that.”

Sloane put herself between the body and the family as Wu took off his jacket to help shield them and lead them out. She glanced back at the body and frowned sympathetically.

“You okay?” Nick asked quietly, drawing her attention back.

“Yeah…of course.” She turned back. “We should probably go with them while they go over the scene, right?”

“Yeah...Hey, I-” She turned to head out before he managed to put his words together and he sighed.

They went to the hospital, where Daniel was sedated and a few blood tests were run. His immune system was apparently on high alert and he was stressed, but nothing showing there was any reason he’d be capable of violence. So they went to talk to his father.

Daniel’s father, Tom, described how a year ago Daniel seemed to change overnight from a sweet child to a child with violent, abusive mood swings, with no memory of these incidents. No doctor, psychiatrist, or specialist was able to do anything for him or even diagnose him. Taking him to the church to see Monsignor Paul and try an exorcism was a last resort.

“Is Daniel your biological son?” Nick asked carefully.

Tom looked confused and a little affronted by the question, looking to Hank and Sloane to see how that had any relevance. They nodded but he still seemed put off. “Of course he's ours.”

“Do you see a physical change in Daniel?” Nick went on.

Now he seemed a little more in line with the questioning. “Sometimes.”

“Can you describe it?” Hank asked.

He hesitated, trying to find the words. “A change comes over his face, like... like there is something inside of him that is trying to control him,” he said, sounding desperate to be understood.

“Have you ever seen anyone else change like this?” Nick asked.

“No. I just know there is something...horrible happening inside my son.” He sighed raggedly before walking off back towards the hospital room.

“So we know what we're dealing with here, right?” Hank asked hopefully as they started walking back to the entrance.

“I don't know.”

“I can’t be sure either,” Sloane agreed. “Too little information…Aggression can be common in a lot of wesen species.”

“He said he saw something in Daniel,” Hank pointed out.

“If Daniel were wesen, then the dad would have to be,” Nick said. “Or the mom,” he amended. “Or both. At least one would have to be, I think.”

“I don’t know much about wesen breeding, sorry,” Sloane said, trying to make it clear it was not a subject she had interest in.

“All right, what if one is, the other's hiding it?” Hank asked.

“Oh, I think that'd be hard to hide for long,” Nick said.

“I can’t try and make them woge in the hospital, too many witnesses,” Sloane said.

“Well, someone else might be able to give us a clearer picture on wesen family planning…”

They planned to meet up at the spice shop the next day. Sloane went home and took a shower, trying to drench her neck in hot water to try and sooth it. Then she went to bed.

Going to the shop tomorrow, it was rather amusing to watch Nick try to delicately ask about how the wesen genes were passed on to Monroe and Rosalee. She still had the scarf around her neck, and gloves around her hands.

“So if one parent is wesen and the other one isn't, what would the child be?” he finally asked.

Rosalee paused in moving ingredients from the back room to the front and looked at him. “You mean a wesen and a kehrseite?”

“Yeah,” Hank said, shrugging slightly.

Monroe was locking up, expecting to council them for some time, and rubbed his hands together. “So I guess it's time for the whole birds and the bienen-wesen talk,” he said with a smile. Rosalee chuckled and Sloane rolled her eyes. The puns were getting out of hand. He cleared his throat as he sat back with Rosalee. “Okay. If both parents are wesen, then the child will be too.”

“Or if one parent is wesen and the other is kehrseite, then there's a 50/50 chance that the child will be wesen,” Rosalee said.

“Unless the kehrseite is a Kehrseite-Gentrager,” Monroe quickly interjected. Rosalee nodded, not having thought of that apparently but knowing he was right. “Then you're definitely getting a wesen.”

“Let's pretend I understood what you just said…” Hank said slowly.

“Two wesen parents, definitely wesen. One wesen one human, fifty-fifty chance. A gentrager is a child who isn’t wesen but has a wesen family member close enough the gene could be passed on, like a non-wesen child from the other pairing,” Sloane said.

“I thought you didn’t know much about this?” Nick asked.

“I don’t, but Gentrager literally means “Gene carrier”, so…kinda obvious?” she said practically.

Rosalee smiled and nodded. “That’s right.”

“Okay…What if both parents are wesen, but different kinds?” Hank asked.

“You mean like a Grundverschiedene situation like us?” Rosalee asked, gesturing between her and Monroe a little awkwardly.

“Well, we don't mean to pry,” Nick said, trying to feign understanding.

“Yeah, we do,” Hank said Hank said, not even embarrassed.

“Yep,” Sloane agreed.

“Well, then you're looking at a Vorherrscher, But... As long as it's healthy, we don't care,” Monroe said, putting an arm around Rosalee. His eye was probably cast towards the future given the happy smile. Nick and Hank glanced to Sloane, who shrugged helplessly, her eyes saying ‘they lost me’.

Nick’s phone started ringing then and he quickly picked up. “Burkhardt. …We are on our way,” he said, already moving towards the door as he hanged up. “Seminary student's conscious,” he told Hank and Sloane, who quickly followed him. “Thank you for your help... I think.”

“Hey, don't expect to just get it all in one talk,” Monroe called after them.

They went and spoke the seminary student, who broke down why they went through with the exorcism and how it went wrong. How Daniel started fighting them, and how his face changed into “the face of a demon”.  They left him to keep getting some rest and headed back down the hospital corridors.

“So what are we dealing with? Is the kid wesen, or is he, and I hesitate to say this... possessed by some demon?” Hank asked quietly.

“I don't think he's wesen,” Nick said. “Even if one parent was, they would know and they wouldn't put their child through this.”

“I agree. Unless the mom had a fling with something on the literal wild side,” Sloane said.

“Looked into that, they did blood tests as part of some of his past medical trials,” Hank said. “Definitely his parents’ son.”

“Well, then definitely not wesen. Unless they don’t know, but most wesen will have woged by now at least once I would think,” she said.

“So that leaves demon,” Hank sighed.

“I got nothing else,” Nick sighed.

“I wish you hadn't said that.”

Sloane gave them both a sly look. “Wait, did you guys think we only had to worry about wesen?”

The two men paused and gave her incredulous looks. Before they could ask for any clarification though, they heard a scream coming from down the hall. Rushing towards the commotion, a nurse practically threw herself out of Daniel’s room, screaming still. She grabbed for Hank, shaking with terror. “I saw it! I saw it! Some kind of monster in that boy!”

“Ma'am, I need you to relax and just calm down. Breathe,” Hank said gently. Sloane and Nick both slowly went to the door of the room.

Daniel was sitting up in bed, his head bent down. Slowly Nick went over, gently putting a hand on the boy’s shoulder. “Daniel?” The boy looked up and suddenly his face morphed, turning gray and stone-like, with veins of black like marble running through it. He opened his mouth and snarled at him. Nick backed up quickly and practically pulled Sloane to his side.

“Holy crap,” she muttered. “This is like…” She glanced up at Nick, who was pointedly not looking at her.

Hank came in at that moment, sucking in a breath when he saw him. “What the hell is this?”

“I don't know…” Nick breathed.

“Yeah, that’s…new,” Sloane finally settled on, taking Nick’s que he didn’t want to talk about his own condition.

“Well, I know what it looks like,” Hank said. “How do we handle it?”

“I think we just stay back,” Nick said.

They watched warily until Daniel’s face suddenly morphed back and he collapsed, near catatonic, back on the bed. “That was really weird,” Hank said.

“I consider most of what you think is weird normal and even I say, _that_ was weird,” Sloane agreed.

“I think it reacts to confrontation,” Nick said.

They all paused when they heard him say, “I wanna go home,” like any normal kid would. Sloane frowned, remember that feeling suddenly very viscerally, being in a hospital room much like this one.

“We need to put a guard on this room,” Nick said.

“I need to make a call, see what another source I have might know,” Sloane said. She glanced at Nick. “I don’t think they’re ready for you yet though,” she said more quietly.

“…Okay. Focus on this for now, Daniel comes first,” he said back. “We’ll go to the spice shop again, maybe Rosalee or Monroe know something,” Nick said. They split up, Nick having to speak with Daniel’s doctor quickly to keep her from going inside.

Sloane rushed home and started speed reading her index cards for anything that might stand out while calling her contact again. Nothing stood out among her notes though. She only had twenty books when she traveled, a fraction of what her family had, and she had to admit after staying in Portland for a few weeks she was beginning to see how limited her knowledge was relying on just these books.

Finally she called the Portland number again.

“Sloane? Two calls in two days?”

“Yes, I’m afraid so,” she sighed, rubbing over her face.

“You know I said I wouldn’t have anything for a week at least, remember?” Gallin said, a bit skeptical of the call.

“No, I remember, but this isn’t about Nick. Not exactly. We got a case that has similar symptoms. This kid…he’s becoming pail, aggressive, no memory of what’s going on. But it’s been going on for a year or more, no contact with a Cracher Mortal. No wesen heritage either. And now someone is dead. …”

Gallin was more alert. “A Keirsheite child is…Hmmm…Was the killing intentional?”

“No, I don’t think so, it was an older man—not in the most fit condition—and this kid is like 8. It was a priest trying to perform an exorcism.”

“…I’m sorry?”

“You heard me,” Sloane said definitvely. “They think he’s possessed by something. His subordinate is traumatized, says the kid was like a demon.”

“…Do you think he is?”

She sighed again. No, I don’t think so. I mean demons?” she laughed. Gallin was oddly quiet and Sloane frowned. “…Do you know something I don’t?”

“You know as well as I do, wesen are not the only thing to worry about in the world.”

“ …Yes,” she sighed. “I know. But do you know anything that acts like this? Black veins and aggression and mindlessness?”

“It sounds familiar, but its on the fringe of my mind,” Gallin sighed. “Something that doesn’t come up often. Something about the 17th century…But I’m just one person here, and again it’ll take me a bit to inquire elsewhere.”

“No…it’s okay, we have other sources possibly.”

“Oh? You wound me, Sloane. Trying to make me jealous?” Gallin joked.

“Just using what I got,” Sloane said matter-of-factly. “If you find anything out, let me know. We’re going to keep working on it.”

“Very well. You know I would appreciate sharing what you find as well.”

“Of course. But I better go.”

“Alright. Stay safe,” Gallin said gently.

“I’ll try.” Sloane hanged up and fell back on the daybed in her study heavily. That boy was scared. She knew he was. His wasn’t just some wesen problem. There had to be information somewhere.

Her phone rang after she was again going over some forms of mind controlling wesen and picked it up. “Nick?”

“Yeah, hey. Any luck?”

“No…I started reading through some of the journals again, but nothing is sticking out. My contact isn’t sure either. I’m not sure what an actual possession would look like.”

“…We’ll talk about this “actual possession” thing later. Monroe and Rosalee think they have something. I’m going to put you on speaker so you can hear.” There was a beep and then the sound of Nick putting his phone down on what she assumed was a table.

“Okay, well,” Rosalee said. “Every generation has heard stories about Grausens. They go way back.”

“Grausens?” Sloane asked, frowning.

“It’s not a wesen, or at least we don’t think it is,” Rosalee said.

“They used to think they were a wesen spirit that would invade a child,” Monroe said.

“But never a wesen child,” Rosalee added.

“Right, Kehrseite kids only.”

“But the thinking has changed since medicine and science has advanced. Now, some believe it's... A mutation,” she said seriously.

“So which is it?” Nick asked.

“Nick, these are incredibly rare occurrences,” Monroe said, clearly a bit shocked about this turn of events.

“I mean... It doesn't really matter because they've always been dealt with the same way,” Rosalee added.

“How is it dealt with?”

There was a pause and then Rosalee sighed. “They would disappear. The wesen council is responsible for dealing with them. Sometime in the 1600s, the council communicated for the first time with royals and Grimms. They forged an alliance. For the safety of all of them.”

“Excuse me?” Sloane asked, shocked now as well.

“Supposedly, Grausens, if left to grow to maturity, become some of the world's most notorious psychopaths, wreaking havoc on like whole continents sometimes,” Monroe said.

“Historically, wesen were to blame for what Grausens have done.”

“All of it?” Sloane asked dubiously.

“Well, no, we’ve done our fair share of…morally dubious things. I mean not us specifically, but wesen…” Monroe amended. “But still, Grausens are a whole other problem, for both sides!”

“That's why the council steps in,” Rosalee agreed.

“Who is this council anyway?” Hank asked.

“They enforce wesen law,” Rosalee clarified.

“You guys have your own laws?”

“Oh, baby,” Monroe huffed.

“If this is indeed a Grausen, we have no choice but to inform the council,” Rosalee said darkly.

“Inform them means what? Daniel disappears?”

“Basically. Yeah. It's a death sentence for the kid,” Monroe said.

“It's a death sentence for us if we don't,” Rosalee bit back. Sloane a bit of shock at that, not expecting Rosalee to toss a kid under the bus.

“How do we even know he is Grausen?” Nick said.

“The law is clear. Even if it's a possibility, we have to inform the council,” Rosalee said.

“That's why we shouldn't even be having this conversation,” Monroe stage whispered.

“Now you tell us?” Hank asked.

“Well, look. If we knew you were gonna talk about Grausens, we would’ve said "don't... Talk about Grausens”,” He finished lamely.

“We're not worried about the council, we're worried about the kid,” Hank said.

“Now we get to worry about both…” Nick said. He glanced at the phone. “…Sloane? You still there?”

She was quiet a second more before speaking with cold rigidity to the phone. “No, we aren’t going to just let them take that kid.”

“Sloane-” Rosalee started.

“No, you listen up. I may not be the nicest Grimm out there, but I do have a set of goddamn morals. And one of those morals is “No killing kids.” They can grow up and seek revenge if they want, but I don’t kill them when they’re not even old enough to shave. Handing kids over to wesen death squads or whatever? Counts in my book. We’re finding another way.”

Nick was surprised by the conviction in her voice and smiled a little, picking up his phone. “You heard the lady. Thanks for the info, but we’re not giving up just yet.”

Sloane smiled as well, though couldn’t deny she was at a loss as to how they were going to do that exactly. Nick took her off speaker and held the phone up to his ear. “Hey, we’re leaving the shop now. I’m going to go to the trailer, try to see if any books have something on this Grausen. You coming?”

“Normally I would, but I get the feeling I should keep a close eye on the kid now.”

“Didn’t know you had such a soft spot for children.”

“To be honest, I hate children,” Sloane said. Nick wasn’t all that surprised she’d say that but somehow doubted that was completely true. “But again, don’t want them dead. So I’ll keep an eye on him, look out for trouble. Besides, you’re pretty good at researching. Though you should let me organize the books some time, index cards make it a lot easier.”

“There are a lot of books to index,” he pointed out.

“Sounds like a fun weekend to me,” she said honestly.

“Also didn’t take you for a nerd…Although you did say you watch Star Trek, so not that surprising?” he said, teasing.

She rolled her eyes, but felt her lips twitch. Nick had been so awkward around her, it was nice he was actually doing that again. “Whatever. If you do find something, let me know.”

“Will do.”

They hanged up and Sloane went back to the hospital, heading inside to keep a look out near Daniel’s room. She brought with her a spiral notebook and a sketch book, doing a few sketches of passing people and even a vague rendition of a “Grausen” that she could use for her own entry later. She waited with half an eye on the doorway and the officer there. And also dodging Daniel’s parents, who were not allowed inside and were rather irate about it. A few hours into her wait, her phone buzzed and she saw it was Nick. Standing, she answered it and headed for the front door. “Hey.”

“Hey. We’re on our way to the hospital.”

“Why, you got something?” she asked hopefully.

“Maybe. Apparently, a couple of my ancestors did encounter Grausens in the past. But they did turn them over to the council because it not being wesen, it wasn’t their problem.”

“I…guess I see the logic there, but still…” she said, disappointed.

“Yeah,” he sighed, not too proud of them either. “Anyway, one had a theory that it was the result of a disease, not a spirit or a demon or a mutation.”

“A disease? Really?” she asked. It made sense she supposed, but what an illness.

“Yeah. Juliette read it with me, and she thinks he might have a point. Apparently, diseases can do a lot to people and their brains.”

“Okay…but do we have a cure?”

Nick sighed. “Not yet, no. That’s why we’re coming to the hospital. Juliette thinks if we can find out what exactly the family was doing a year ago before his symptoms started, it might help us understand what it is.”

“Okay…Do you want me to ask then?”

“No, we’re already on our way and Juliette knows more about this kind of stuff than either of us.”

“Point taken. The police guard is doing his job and not letting anyone in, so I’ll just meet you outside.”

“Right, be there soon.”

They hanged up and Sloane sighed and reclined back against the entrance. Luckily she didn’t have long to wait, Nick and Juliette arrived minutes later and they all headed inside together. Daniel’s parents were once again trying to get into their son’s room, but having no luck.

“Excuse me,” Tom said to Nick, shooting Sloane an annoyed glare because she wouldn’t help earlier and had successfully eluded them. “There is a policeman that is standing in front of our son's room, and he is not letting us in.”

“We're very sorry, sir. We can't take any chances on anybody else getting hurt.”

“Told you,” Sloane said.

“They're not helping him here,” his wife, Nancy, said.

“We don't know if they can,” Nick said honestly. “This is Juliette Silverton. She's been working with me on the case.”

“I'm sorry, but we're gonna have to ask you guys just a few more questions,” Juliette said gently.

“More questions is not gonna help our son!” Tom shouted.

“We are trying to do that,” Sloane said as patiently as possible.

“We need to know exactly what happened a year ago when you first started noticing a change in Daniel's behavior,” Juliette said.

“Nothing happened,” Tom said, getting more impatient. “Nothing happened. This... look, this all came out of nowhere, and it's just kept getting worse.”

“What about before that, say, a month or two?”

“Well, we were on vacation,” Nancy said slowly, remembering.

“Where did you go?” Nick asked.

“Egypt. Israel, Jordan. With a tour group.”

“And how was Daniel on the trip?” Sloane asked.

“He was fine,” Tom snapped.

“But no...” Nancy said, shaking her head.

“He was... he was fine,” he repeated, as if trying to make it true.

“No, he got the flu,” she said more earnestly. “He was sick... For about three days. They gave him antibiotics and then he was fine.”

“Did they happen to do anything like a culture?” Juliette asked.

“No, they just said it was the flu, and that he could've gotten it anywhere. He was swimming in the Jordan river, we were in the dead sea, we were hiking…”

“I'm sorry, I just don't see what this could possibly have to do with anything,” Tom said again.

“Look, we’re trying to help,” Sloane said. “We want to know what’s affecting your son, and unless it’s an avenue you’ve tried already, why don’t you at least hear us out instead of deciding it’s a stupid round of questions?”

He glared at her but Sloane didn’t back down. Nick patted her shoulder to silently tell her to relax. “We don't know if it will help. We're just running down all leads.”

“When can we see our son?” Nancy asked more desperately.

“Let me check,” Nick said, tugging Sloane along as he and Juliette went down the hall. When they were far enough away he spoke quietly to Juliette. “So it's possible that he could've been infected while they were on vacation.”

“Whenever any pathogen is introduced, the body has an immunological response,” Juliette confirmed.

“The flu-like symptoms?”

“Yes.”

“All the way in Egypt too…” Sloane said. “It’s already rare, not something we see in the America’s often I’m guessing.”

Nick nodded, walking up to the officer at the door. “Any problems?”

“No, sir. It's been quiet. Detective Larson checked in earlier too and I had the same answer.”

“So nobody in or out?”

“Tell you the truth, they've been kinda staying away,” the officer said with a sigh.

“He looks so young,” Juliette said sadly. Sloane looked in as well, at the small body lying under the sheets on the hospital bed, and couldn’t deny a twinge of sympathy. She remembered what it was like to be that small in a bed like that…

They ended up parting ways again and Sloane went home for the evening. She sat at her desk in her study, writing down some of the things they suspected, looking up certain words on her phone for spelling. At the end she wrote down questions that came to mind. _Disease? Virus? Mutation? Effects kids. Only keirsheite. Wesen council usually takes care of them._ She paused there, her mind flashing back to a day she’d rather forget. A rough, gravely voice snarling _“Find the damn kid, we need to take care of her too!”_ She shook her head a little, not wanting to relive that moment.

She was about to get ready for bed when her phone went off and she picked it up. “Larson.”

“Sloane, its me,” Nick said urgently. “I just got a call from Monroe, someone from the council is here looking for Daniel.”

“What?” she gasped. “How…whatever, on my way to the hospital!” She hanged up and redressed quickly, remembering the scarf when she glanced in the mirror and saw the purpled, finger-like bruises, and rushed out the door. She met Nick and Juliette just as they were entering and rushed to the room with them. They were intercepted by the Doctor, who explained Daniel was released half an hour ago to his parents.

“Why?” Nick asked.

“Because we don't know what to treat him for,” The doctor said simply. “His parents took him home.”

“You didn't think to notify us?”

“The police were notified. The officer standing by knew what we were doing,” she said primly. “This hospital needs beds for patients we can treat.”

“Glad to know you give up so easily when it’s a sick kid!” Sloane spat.

The doctor bristled, about to say something, when Hank pushed his way through and practically blocked her. “Sorry, I got here as soon as I could.”

“They released Daniel,” Nick said.

“I know, I just got the message.”

“We have to get to his house.” They all quickly filed back out, condensing into one car for the ride.

At the Keary house, they were able to get his parents to listen, though Tom was still a bit reticent. They were able to come in and take a look at Daniel, who was sleeping peacefully in his bed, even with a growing thunderstorm outside. Afterwards, Juliette spoke to the parents about getting him tested. Sloane, Hank and Nick stood in the hallway.

“What do we know about this council guy?” Hank asked.

“Only that he's here. Definitely wesen, definitely dangerous,” Sloane sighed.

“We can run a check with the airlines. He must've gotten in sometime af...” Nick started. They all jumped when they heard a loud clatter and crash come from Daniel’s room. They rushed for the door, throwing it open in time to see a man—no, a wesen of some sort—dive out the open window with an animal like growl.

Hank looked to the bed immediately. “The boy's gone.”

“I'm going after them,” Nick said. “Stay in the house.”

“You must be talking to them,” Sloane said, following him out the window. Outside it was dark and cold, the family living on land butting up to the forests. Sloane and Nick stuck close as they rushed through the trees, looking for signs of a kid running scared.

“I think I hear something up ahead!”

Sloane paused and let her Grimm side take over a little, focusing on her vision so she could see better in the dark punctuated by only brief moments of lightning from the coming storm. She didn’t have the keen focus of an eagle or a telescoping lens, but she could just make out a form in the distance. “I see him! And the wesen!” She took off at a sprint, Nick close behind. He could hear snarls as the wesen found the boy, taking swipes at him. Luckily they missed, Daniel able to duck around him to get away just as Sloane drop kicked the wesen—a Pflichttreue now that she could see him—away from his trail. He rose and roared at her, but Nick had come around the other way and punched him in the back. Sloane kicked him again in the gut, both Grimms ducked at a couple of furious swipes of his claws. One hand caught her scarf and pulled it, but she ducked out and away, letting him take it before booting him right up into the armpit. And then a hard hit from Nick sent him back into a tree. He woged back into a man with sharp cheekbones and an aquiline nose who glared at the two of them.

Hank came up a second later, gun drawn with his flashlight trained on the man. “You want me to shoot him?” he asked.

“Actually, I do.”

“Oh thank god,” Sloane sighed.

“But not yet.”

She glared a little at him. “Getting my hopes up, how dare you…”

“Can you handle him?” Nick asked Hank.

Hank nodded readily. “Go.”

Both Grimms took off again in the direction Daniel had gone. It was getting harder to navigate the woods with the darkness and the wind picking up. Nick paused at one point however, his head cocked to one angle. Sloane tensed slightly when his skin paled, but he still seemed in his right mind. “I think I hear him…Daniel! You don't have to be afraid. We're trying to help you!” He started off again and Sloane followed. “Daniel!”

“Daniel!” Sloane shouted, trying to see through the dark but the trees were just too thick now.

“Nick! Sloane!” They paused, looking back the way they came to see Tom and Juliette rushing for them holding electric lanterns.

“I think I know where he's gone,” Tom panted. “We built a fort together. This way,” He turned to keep heading into the woods.

“It is really cold,” Juliette said. “If he's out here much longer he could die.”

“Then we better hurry!” Sloane said, picking up the pace.

They kept winding through the woods along a simple trail until they found a very basic structure made of bits of scrap wood and a camouflage tarp and tree branches. “This is it! Daniel!” He quickly rushed in and his panic ramped up another notch. “Daniel!” They all crowded in, finding the boy curled up and deathly pale.

Juliette knelt down, taking off her glove to feel his cheek. “He's freezing.”

“Oh, wait, wait. You gotta be careful when you wake him up,” Tom said, obviously fearing one of Daniel’s outbursts. Daniel didn’t respond to the touch however, limp and practically lifeless.

“He's really cold. I think he's hypothermic,” Juliette said, trying to stay calm despite the direness of the situation.

“Oh, my God, look! It's happening again,” Tom said, grabbing them back as black veins spread briefly over Daniel’s face like cracks of lightning. They didn’t stay however.

“We have to get him back to the house and get him warmed up,” Juliette said, moving to pick him up.

Nick made her stop. “Wait…If this thing needs a human body to live in, isn't it dependent on the temperature of the body?”

Juliette looked at him and gave a hesitant, “Yeah…?”

Sloane blinked but then straightened. “Wait…you mean…”

“What happens if the body's too cold to support it?” Nick said, glad that she caught on.

“It would die,” Juliette said, catching on as well.

“Wait, what are you talking about?” Tom asked.

“Certain organisms can only survive within a narrow temperature range. The drop in his body temperature could kill whatever's inside him,” Juliette said, looking excited.

“Well, wait, how do we know that's not gonna kill Daniel too?” Tom said.

They all paused, knowing that was a huge risk. “If his body temperature were to drop too far too fast...” Juliette said ominously.

“How do we know that hasn't happened already?” Tom snapped. They all looked to the prone, pale child in front of them. He was looking far too much like a corpse.

“Nick, we can't do this,” Juliette said.

“This could be Daniel's only chance,” Nick said seriously.

“We try this or he ends up either with the council or crazed the rest of his life…” Sloane said.

“He's my son!” Tom shouted.

Nick gave him a steady, assessing look. “Then you make the decision.”

Tom was taken aback and then swallowed, looking back down at Daniel. He hesitated a few moments but then looked closer at him. “Oh, my God…something's happening.”

Sloane looked closer as well and then recoiled when she saw an oozing, yellow substance leaking out of Daniel’s ears and nose. “What is that?”

“It worked,” Juliette breathed. “The parasite's dying.” They watched the yellow ooze turn black and chipped away like dried blood. “We have to get him back now,” Juliette said. “Come on. Nick, get a sample.” Nick took her rubber glove, carefully taking a sample of the dried ooze and bagging it while Tom picked Daniel up and rushed him outside. They sprinted all the way back to the house and quickly got him out of his wet clothes and under some warm blankets on the couch.

“Is he going to be alright?” Nancy asked.

“I think so…” Juliette said.

Sloane sighed in relief quietly.

“…Sloane, what happened to your neck?”

Sloane blinked and then felt over her neck, remembering that her scarf was gone. Nick looked at her guiltiy but she shrugged. “Fighting, got some bruises. It’s okay.” She glanced at Nick. “I’ll be fine.”

Nick breathed deeply, trying to tell himself that as well. “I think we have someone we need to help Hank deal with back out there…”

She nodded and they went back out to the woods, getting the Pflichttreue into custody and back down to the station. They let him stay there overnight while Daniel was taken back to the hospital for tests. The next afternoon, they had him brought to an interrogation room.

“I don’t like this plan,” Sloane said.

“That’s why you’ll be in the observation room,” Nick said patiently. “The plan is this way so that he can take this information back with him and any other “Grausen” in the future can be cured.”

“The fact I can’t call it a bad plan isn’t the issue, I just don’t like it because I don’t get to hurt him,” she said.

Nick rolled his eyes. “I got this…Hey, um…About…what happened the other day.” He glanced at her neck.

She sighed. “Nick, it’s fine, it wasn’t you—”

“It was,” he said sharply. “It was me…I wasn’t in control, but it was me. And I’m sorry. But…I still want to train with you. Maybe not sparring, but other things. Things to sharpen my abilities because…whatever this is, it’s doing that for me at least. And I want to learn to control it. And get better at other skills. My knife throwing still sucks,” he said, trying to smile. “Not something I can really practice at home. If you’re not um…put off by me.”

Sloane eyed him for a second before smiling. “Okay. No sparring, but we can work on that stuff. You know, I wondered if anything was going to leak out of your nose last night…”

“Is it weird to say I’m disappointed it didn’t?” he said.

“Eh…I’ll give it pass.”

He smiled as they split off and he went into the interrogation room. He presented the man—Alexander was all they got from him as far as a name—with the hospital reports. Sloane leaned against the side of the wall while she watched from behind the two-way mirror.

“Those are the medical reports run on Daniel Keary after we took him in,” Nick said.

“What does this prove?” Alexander asked, not impressed by the small file.

“Daniel was infected by a _parasite_ that caused him to be what you and the council call a Grausen.” He perked up at that, looking at the file with more interests. “It's not possession by demon, it's not mutation, and Daniel has been cured.”

Alexander looked at him again more shrewdly. “You're a Grimm. You should know better. I need to see the boy.”

“No, you don't.” Sloane had to smile a bit at the matter-of-fact way Nick shot him down. “And you need to take my word for it, because of what my ancestors and the council agreed to at the charter of Wittenberg in 1682.” Alexander looked surprised and Sloane had to snort out a laugh. She supposed that was one way to get the point across. “Take the report with you when you go. I want the council to read it.”

“You're letting me go?” he asked, somewhat surprised. Sloane sighed a bit but knew Nick was right, so there would be no tracking Alexander down to finish him off. And in this case it was better that way.

Nick smiled a little. “I like to think we live in an enlightened age... Where fear does not drive belief. That we find the truth behind the fear.”

“Fear is not an easy thing to change,” Alexander said sagely. Sloane tried not to sympathize with that sentiment too much. It felt like Nick was talking to her with his last, singular word to him though.

“Try.”

\-------------------------

It was the weekend when they met up again for training. Sloane arrived to see Nick’s car already there, so she headed down to meet him at the usual spot. No one was there however. “Nick?” She looked around, frowning when she didn’t spot him. “Nick, you here?”

There was a tense moment when it felt very quiet, before Sloane quickly leapt forward, turning to confront whoever had the balls to sneak up on her.

It happened to be Nick, holding padded bats very similar to the one she brought to train with in both hands, one slightly raised as if he was going to tap her with it. He smiled. “Should’ve known I couldn’t actually sneak up on you…”

“Yes…you should have,” she said slowly. “What’s the deal with the bat? I thought we were going to do more knife throwing.”

“We can do that later. I thought maybe to warm up with, we could do a little…Grimm bat challenge?” he said, unsure of the name.

Sloane frowned. “Nick, that’s just a kids game, we—”

“Hear me out, please,” he said, holding up a hand, the bat dangling between his thumb and palm. “Look, the truth is…I like the games. I like learning from you too with knife throwing and sparring isn’t too bad either—When I’m not turning into a zombie. But the games…it’s a way to kind of cut loose while still training. And get to know you. So maybe they aren’t just for kids. And even if they are…I don’t think it’s terrible to do stuff you enjoyed as a kid even when you’re grown. I still enjoy the occasional kid movie I remember from when I was young. I make chocolate and banana pancakes on my birthday like my dad did still. It brings back nice memories…But then…we both had to kind of grow up quick after losing people important to us. You even more so than me.” He flipped the bat and offered the handle to her. “Going back to your roots, to something you enjoyed, even if you can’t enjoy them with the people you used to, isn’t a bad thing now and then. I think your grandmother would like you to have fun training me. Because that’s what parents and caregivers want for their kids, is to grow up but still be happy and have fun when they can. I think we both deserve a little bit of fun disguised as training now and then in order to do that.”

Sloane hesitated a moment before she reached up and grabbed the handle. “…You are annoyingly persuasive sometimes.”

Nick smiled and held up his bat like a sword. “Fifty paces?”

“Fifty paces…and then I kick your ass as usual, Burkhardt,” she said with a smirk.

Nick smirked back. “Bring it on, Larson.”

**Author's Note:**

> So, here's we we start diverging a tiny bit from canon--as it always frustrated me that Nick's transformation kind of just...petered off and no one brought them up again. More on this next chapter!


End file.
